March 20, 2025 • 16 mins
A fun week of development and performance.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hello, welcome to Starting Stand Up.
(00:01):
If you're new here, this is apodcast where I try to get good
at stand up and I journal itaudio style.
No video, just audio.
You have stumbled on a man'sjournal and if you like journals
and if you like secrets and ifyou like inappropriate entries
into a journal, you've come tothe right place.
(00:23):
I hope you'll stick around.
Entries into a journal You'vecome to the right place.
I hope you'll stick around.
For those who have been here,we've got a great episode for
you.
We did two open mics Sunday.
This is a report and lessonslearned, some surprises, a
little, some details, and thenwe'll be on our merry way.
Oh man, that's rubbish, that'srubbish.
(01:09):
I just listened to both my setsfrom Sunday and it's getting
easier to do.
I must say this one was wild.
Okay, I went to the MonjoyTavern, monjoy Hill Tavern,
which has a Sunday night openmic, which is the kind of open
mic where no one wants there tobe an open mic.
This is a dive bar.
(01:29):
It actually has nice lightingand it's a nice dive bar, but
it's not.
There's not a, there's not ahipster, it's.
It is Authentico and I believeit's mostly.
The most of the regulars areArmy vets and you go in and
where you do the open mic youcan barely.
It's like half the bar can'teven see you.
(01:51):
So the guy who hosted it startedat 7 pm.
The guy who hosted it startedtalking and the din around the
bar got louder.
It was like people wereactively protesting the open mic
and I was going up second.
So I was like this activelyprotesting the open mic and I
was going up second.
So I was like this is going tobe wonderful.
So he gets up.
He's admittedly said he's not agood host, like he just really
(02:16):
struggles and I must say kudosto just respect to everyone I'm
meeting in this sort of mainstandup scene.
You know they're just likediving into.
This guy hosts an open mic sohe can work on doing something
that does not come naturally, sohe's working on it.
Respect.
Anyway, I'm going second.
(02:38):
The first guy goes up.
He's a guy I've seen around.
He's a guy I've been doingabout five years.
He gets up and starts justdoing crowd work and everyone
starts paying attention becausehe's ripping on a group of dudes
for having small dicks and alland they love it.
He's talking about how they'reall like construction workers
and they don't work.
He's just ripping on everyoneand that's what the dive bar
(02:59):
vibe needed to be just good,friendly ripping.
Now I'm rolling in there with aset that I have been working on
hard, you have heard, if you'velistened to the last few
episodes, this is the set thathas been developed by this idea
that I'm meditating like amadman and all I'm realizing is
(03:19):
that I'm just becoming moreaware that I'm a degenerate.
What I did was I wrote, wrote,wrote.
I got, I would say, four orfive minutes and a whole bunch
of jokes.
I recorded them all.
I sent the recording to a groupof friends and I just got
feedback.
I incorporated feedback.
(03:39):
Special thanks, you know whoyou are.
And then I spent all weekendreally kind of tightening,
tightening, tightening.
And then I was like, okay, I'vegot the best joke, I think, for
each of the premise setups.
I'm going to go do it, let'ssee, let's see if my compass for
what I think is funny isactually funny.
(03:59):
And then I roll into this placeand I'm like it's like a bunch
of like thousand yard stare armyvets sipping very off off brand
you know, beer out of a bottle.
I'm gonna play you a clip, butI start in on it and no one's
really listening and it's peopledrink orders.
(04:20):
There's no real hush at all.
I just I'm like screw it, let'sjust do it.
In hindsight I would haveshould have just scrapped the
set and I should have just goneand done crowd work or had a
whole other set at the ready.
I think the big realization isso much of this work is having
(04:40):
material ready for any contextfor any setting.
Material ready for any contextfor any setting.
And so if I had a dirty set ora set where I could rip on you
know, people in the Air Forceand it was all army people there
, you know anything like thatthat would have been great.
But alas, as a beginner, wehave just what we have.
(05:01):
And so I go into it and I'llplay you this clip.
But I start talking aboutmeditation and About anger and
how, you know, meditation issupposed to help you with your
anger.
But this man who's just deathstaring me at the bar, he's just
been looking at me with likereally intense kind of slightly
scary eyes, long hair beard.
(05:24):
He interrupts my act and hejust starts.
He screams and this is what hesaid.
No, no, meditation is likesupposed to soothe anger too.
It's weird.
It's not doing that for me,like it's not nirvanic bliss,
it's a fucking.
This guy meditates.
(05:46):
My god, you're gonna like this.
It's a 12-step program.
So I said you heard me say myguy and I'm so upset, but I'll
be okay, but I'm just so upset.
The joke was oh, I'd like tointroduce you to my meditation
(06:07):
teacher or something like that.
I don't know if I came up withthat or my friend did after when
I was telling this story, butI'm going to take credit because
this is my podcast.
That's a perfect example oflike you listen back and the
next time I get interruptedduring this set or if someone
has an outburst, that joke isarmed Right.
(06:28):
So it's like, anyway, thatwould have been funnier, but
like who cares, whatever?
But this poor guy.
Here's.
The thing that's hard for me Isthat I feel for this guy.
I would rather have juststopped right then and there and
been like my man, what's goingon?
Let's break it down, and Ithink you can.
I think because I'm not able todo this sort of rhythm of open
(06:53):
mics, just mic, mic, mic, mic.
10 times a week, mics, two anight, mics for years.
There, the everything gets lessprecious, like, and every time
you're up you're just kind oflike this, this for me, each one
feels like it has to count andreally move me somewhere and I
(07:14):
think that's a bad way to lookat it and I got to let it go.
Time is an illusion.
I just got to go at my own.
What I can do At this stage ofmy life, what can you do?
Just do your best, david, justdo your best.
(07:35):
So that was a fun little moment,I will say, and I'm not going
to do the recording but mybiggest laugh was my closer
no-transcript.
I announced that I have ameditation class every Wednesday
(07:55):
at 9 am and I invite everybodyand everyone liked that and I
got claps.
It was good.
So it was a good ending to avery mediocre, really, I think.
Also I had really long jokes.
They're not like short, they'revery like long and kind of
visual.
So this is all to say that atthe end I was there and I was
(08:16):
like that didn't really count, Ididn't really test it.
I got to wait a week to go andtry this again and it turns out
the Empire Comedy Club, which isthe real comedy club in
Portland has a new Sunday nightopen mic and it was at 830.
So I could do back to back.
So I went there.
I did the whole set.
I actually did 11 minutes and Idid the whole set.
I actually did 11 minutesbecause it was just three of us.
(08:39):
I did the set for two otherstand-ups and then a random
woman who actually I wasn'tgoing to do this set because I
was like guys, I can't, no onecares about this.
And she was like I'm actually aphilosophy major, I'd love to
hear what you have to say aboutspirituality and meditation.
And I was like I have found theperfect audience member and
certainly, and it was great, andit was the first time that I
(09:02):
made actual standups laugh.
I felt like every joke that Ihad written that I liked, they
were genuinely laughing and thatwas a first.
So that was a victory.
I've listened back to that one.
I'm just so slow.
The big note here is I'm soslow.
There's way too many uhs.
You knows there's filler words.
(09:23):
They need to be eliminated.
I mean, you don't have to becrazy with it, but listen to any
of your favorite standups.
You will rarely hear any fillerwords.
Everything is a laser guidedword missile.
So that just takes a lot oftime and extemporaneous speaking
(09:44):
, little nerves.
I just you've heard it on thispodcast I have a lot of those
like halting.
You know, we're still.
We're working on ways to getour brain online and firing
better.
So it was long I did like 11minutes, but there was an
intimacy in the room and, ofcourse, intimacy I like.
(10:05):
I like talking to people, Ilike to feel like I'm just
talking to you and then thingsare good, things went really
well.
So, all in all, it was awonderful Sunday.
We got two more open mics underthe belt Good experience.
All in all, it was a wonderfulSunday.
We got two more open mics underthe belt, good experience, a
renewed sense of, oh yeah, justa big arsenal, a big quiver of
material for every situation.
(10:27):
Keep working.
I'll finish this very shortepisode, this special short one.
We've had a little trouble thisweek developing or writing
after those open mics because ofsome, uh, acting stuff I have
to focus on and so, yeah, we, wehave, we have.
We don't have as much writing.
(10:48):
My writing time got taken up bymemorizing lines.
So, anyway, this is a shortepisode.
I'll.
This is the energy coming off adouble open mic.
I must say, the drive home fromopen mics is kind of this
(11:10):
almost like you have the zoomiesas a dog after you've taken a
bath, like I'm just driving homeand I'm like motor mouthing
Heyo, booga, booga, boo, welcome, welcome.
Welcome the starting stand-up,the podcast that's going to get
(11:31):
you from beginner stand-up tomediocrely beginner.
No I, the damn audio is goingthrough the jeep bluetooth, so
it's it's so bad the sound thatI can't share it, but I will do
a segment of post open michyperactivity mind.
That, I think, is helpfulbecause truthfully and many
(11:57):
stand-ups have said this rightafter you go your brain starts
just firing new ideas.
It's almost like you've got thepipe you like spray in these
open mics and then that createsroom for all the new ideas and
ways to make it better, etcetera, et cetera.
So I got to record that.
I just didn't.
I can't do it through theBluetooth.
(12:18):
That will never happen again.
But rest assured, the 12-minuterant I did after those open
mics, it's the greatest 12minutes in the history of radio.
Too bad, it's gone.
Okay, short episode, busy week,a lot of some acting stuff
coming through.
So if you're hungering for thenormal length.
(12:41):
I do apologize, but I hope anice, short, sweet one, and I
wish you, of course, the mostincredible week, so, so full of
of little laughs, medium laughs,big, hearty chuckles, maybe an
eye-watering laugh.
I'll tell you the story of it.
(13:01):
I'll tell you my oneeye-watering laugh this week.
I hadn't had a laugh like thisin a long time.
My son is playing the trumpetfor school.
It's a required thing.
I was talking to my sister onthe phone, amanda, and Amanda is
an easy laugh If there's anyconfidence I need.
(13:23):
Before going up, I did my standup set for her and, bless her
soul, she was in a car accident.
So she, her laugh is like kindof it's her voice disappears.
It's sort of like she laughs,it's like ah, and then she goes
silent because she's lost herbreath.
So when I do these stand-upsets for my sister, she's
(13:48):
basically silent the whole time,not breathing.
So I have to really go throughit because she's just laughing
the whole time.
So, anyway, her laugh cracks meup so much I should have her on
the pod at some point, anyway.
So we're talking and she's not.
(14:10):
She was pretty down.
And then my son, I'm like man,I can't play the trumpet.
I'm sorry I can't talk to you.
Louie is practicing the trumpetand he never practices and Louie
, just immediately on cue, makesthis noise.
That sounds like such an insanefart.
(14:31):
You know like, and I'm like god, and I hear, I hear amanda
start to laugh, like she knewexactly what I was like laughing
at too.
And then we were.
We basically had louis forabout four minutes.
Louis was making, he was sogood at it he basically puts the
(14:56):
trumpet in the couch cushionand like it's like, you know
like, really great fart sounds.
And it was just, it was a crylaugh to the point where my
daughter came around who wasdoing her homework, and she's
(15:17):
like just so mad that her dadwas like a fart laugher.
I know I'm trying to be funny.
Like that's the only thing thatreally gets me.
It's basically people fallingdown and people with a well and
well-timed farts.
What can I say, man, that's mysense of humor.
All right, that's all I got foryou.
Uh, I don't know what promisesI made, but I 50, 50, we hold to
(15:42):
them.
That's just how we roll.
Uh, anyway, I wish you, I wishyou.
That's right.
I'm coming back to what we weretalking about.
I wish you so much, so mucheye-watering laughter.
Thank you.
Hello, welcome to Starting Stand Up.
(00:01):
If you're new here, this is apodcast where I try to get good
at stand up and I journal itaudio style.
No video, just audio.
You have stumbled on a man'sjournal and if you like journals
and if you like secrets and ifyou like inappropriate entries
into a journal, you've come tothe right place.
(00:23):
I hope you'll stick around.
Entries into a journal You'vecome to the right place.
I hope you'll stick around.
For those who have been here,we've got a great episode for
you.
We did two open mics Sunday.
This is a report and lessonslearned, some surprises, a
little, some details, and thenwe'll be on our merry way.
Oh man, that's rubbish, that'srubbish.
(01:09):
I just listened to both my setsfrom Sunday and it's getting
easier to do.
I must say this one was wild.
Okay, I went to the MonjoyTavern, monjoy Hill Tavern,
which has a Sunday night openmic, which is the kind of open
mic where no one wants there tobe an open mic.
This is a dive bar.
(01:29):
It actually has nice lightingand it's a nice dive bar, but
it's not.
There's not a, there's not ahipster, it's.
It is Authentico and I believeit's mostly.
The most of the regulars areArmy vets and you go in and
where you do the open mic youcan barely.
It's like half the bar can'teven see you.
(01:51):
So the guy who hosted it startedat 7 pm.
The guy who hosted it startedtalking and the din around the
bar got louder.
It was like people wereactively protesting the open mic
and I was going up second.
So I was like this activelyprotesting the open mic and I
was going up second.
So I was like this is going tobe wonderful.
So he gets up.
He's admittedly said he's not agood host, like he just really
(02:16):
struggles and I must say kudosto just respect to everyone I'm
meeting in this sort of mainstandup scene.
You know they're just likediving into.
This guy hosts an open mic sohe can work on doing something
that does not come naturally, sohe's working on it.
Respect.
Anyway, I'm going second.
(02:38):
The first guy goes up.
He's a guy I've seen around.
He's a guy I've been doingabout five years.
He gets up and starts justdoing crowd work and everyone
starts paying attention becausehe's ripping on a group of dudes
for having small dicks and alland they love it.
He's talking about how they'reall like construction workers
and they don't work.
He's just ripping on everyoneand that's what the dive bar
(02:59):
vibe needed to be just good,friendly ripping.
Now I'm rolling in there with aset that I have been working on
hard, you have heard, if you'velistened to the last few
episodes, this is the set thathas been developed by this idea
that I'm meditating like amadman and all I'm realizing is
(03:19):
that I'm just becoming moreaware that I'm a degenerate.
What I did was I wrote, wrote,wrote.
I got, I would say, four orfive minutes and a whole bunch
of jokes.
I recorded them all.
I sent the recording to a groupof friends and I just got
feedback.
I incorporated feedback.
(03:39):
Special thanks, you know whoyou are.
And then I spent all weekendreally kind of tightening,
tightening, tightening.
And then I was like, okay, I'vegot the best joke, I think, for
each of the premise setups.
I'm going to go do it, let'ssee, let's see if my compass for
what I think is funny isactually funny.
(03:59):
And then I roll into this placeand I'm like it's like a bunch
of like thousand yard stare armyvets sipping very off off brand
you know, beer out of a bottle.
I'm gonna play you a clip, butI start in on it and no one's
really listening and it's peopledrink orders.
(04:20):
There's no real hush at all.
I just I'm like screw it, let'sjust do it.
In hindsight I would haveshould have just scrapped the
set and I should have just goneand done crowd work or had a
whole other set at the ready.
I think the big realization isso much of this work is having
(04:40):
material ready for any contextfor any setting.
Material ready for any contextfor any setting.
And so if I had a dirty set ora set where I could rip on you
know, people in the Air Forceand it was all army people there
, you know anything like thatthat would have been great.
But alas, as a beginner, wehave just what we have.
(05:01):
And so I go into it and I'llplay you this clip.
But I start talking aboutmeditation and About anger and
how, you know, meditation issupposed to help you with your
anger.
But this man who's just deathstaring me at the bar, he's just
been looking at me with likereally intense kind of slightly
scary eyes, long hair beard.
(05:24):
He interrupts my act and hejust starts.
He screams and this is what hesaid.
No, no, meditation is likesupposed to soothe anger too.
It's weird.
It's not doing that for me,like it's not nirvanic bliss,
it's a fucking.
This guy meditates.
(05:46):
My god, you're gonna like this.
It's a 12-step program.
So I said you heard me say myguy and I'm so upset, but I'll
be okay, but I'm just so upset.
The joke was oh, I'd like tointroduce you to my meditation
(06:07):
teacher or something like that.
I don't know if I came up withthat or my friend did after when
I was telling this story, butI'm going to take credit because
this is my podcast.
That's a perfect example oflike you listen back and the
next time I get interruptedduring this set or if someone
has an outburst, that joke isarmed Right.
(06:28):
So it's like, anyway, thatwould have been funnier, but
like who cares, whatever?
But this poor guy.
Here's.
The thing that's hard for me Isthat I feel for this guy.
I would rather have juststopped right then and there and
been like my man, what's goingon?
Let's break it down, and Ithink you can.
I think because I'm not able todo this sort of rhythm of open
(06:53):
mics, just mic, mic, mic, mic.
10 times a week, mics, two anight, mics for years.
There, the everything gets lessprecious, like, and every time
you're up you're just kind oflike this, this for me, each one
feels like it has to count andreally move me somewhere and I
(07:14):
think that's a bad way to lookat it and I got to let it go.
Time is an illusion.
I just got to go at my own.
What I can do At this stage ofmy life, what can you do?
Just do your best, david, justdo your best.
(07:35):
So that was a fun little moment,I will say, and I'm not going
to do the recording but mybiggest laugh was my closer
no-transcript.
I announced that I have ameditation class every Wednesday
(07:55):
at 9 am and I invite everybodyand everyone liked that and I
got claps.
It was good.
So it was a good ending to avery mediocre, really, I think.
Also I had really long jokes.
They're not like short, they'revery like long and kind of
visual.
So this is all to say that atthe end I was there and I was
(08:16):
like that didn't really count, Ididn't really test it.
I got to wait a week to go andtry this again and it turns out
the Empire Comedy Club, which isthe real comedy club in
Portland has a new Sunday nightopen mic and it was at 830.
So I could do back to back.
So I went there.
I did the whole set.
I actually did 11 minutes and Idid the whole set.
I actually did 11 minutesbecause it was just three of us.
(08:39):
I did the set for two otherstand-ups and then a random
woman who actually I wasn'tgoing to do this set because I
was like guys, I can't, no onecares about this.
And she was like I'm actually aphilosophy major, I'd love to
hear what you have to say aboutspirituality and meditation.
And I was like I have found theperfect audience member and
certainly, and it was great, andit was the first time that I
(09:02):
made actual standups laugh.
I felt like every joke that Ihad written that I liked, they
were genuinely laughing and thatwas a first.
So that was a victory.
I've listened back to that one.
I'm just so slow.
The big note here is I'm soslow.
There's way too many uhs.
You knows there's filler words.
(09:23):
They need to be eliminated.
I mean, you don't have to becrazy with it, but listen to any
of your favorite standups.
You will rarely hear any fillerwords.
Everything is a laser guidedword missile.
So that just takes a lot oftime and extemporaneous speaking
(09:44):
, little nerves.
I just you've heard it on thispodcast I have a lot of those
like halting.
You know, we're still.
We're working on ways to getour brain online and firing
better.
So it was long I did like 11minutes, but there was an
intimacy in the room and, ofcourse, intimacy I like.
(10:05):
I like talking to people, Ilike to feel like I'm just
talking to you and then thingsare good, things went really
well.
So, all in all, it was awonderful Sunday.
We got two more open mics underthe belt Good experience.
All in all, it was a wonderfulSunday.
We got two more open mics underthe belt, good experience, a
renewed sense of, oh yeah, justa big arsenal, a big quiver of
material for every situation.
(10:27):
Keep working.
I'll finish this very shortepisode, this special short one.
We've had a little trouble thisweek developing or writing
after those open mics because ofsome, uh, acting stuff I have
to focus on and so, yeah, we, wehave, we have.
We don't have as much writing.
(10:48):
My writing time got taken up bymemorizing lines.
So, anyway, this is a shortepisode.
I'll.
This is the energy coming off adouble open mic.
I must say, the drive home fromopen mics is kind of this
(11:10):
almost like you have the zoomiesas a dog after you've taken a
bath, like I'm just driving homeand I'm like motor mouthing
Heyo, booga, booga, boo, welcome, welcome.
Welcome the starting stand-up,the podcast that's going to get
(11:31):
you from beginner stand-up tomediocrely beginner.
No I, the damn audio is goingthrough the jeep bluetooth, so
it's it's so bad the sound thatI can't share it, but I will do
a segment of post open michyperactivity mind.
That, I think, is helpfulbecause truthfully and many
(11:57):
stand-ups have said this rightafter you go your brain starts
just firing new ideas.
It's almost like you've got thepipe you like spray in these
open mics and then that createsroom for all the new ideas and
ways to make it better, etcetera, et cetera.
So I got to record that.
I just didn't.
I can't do it through theBluetooth.
(12:18):
That will never happen again.
But rest assured, the 12-minuterant I did after those open
mics, it's the greatest 12minutes in the history of radio.
Too bad, it's gone.
Okay, short episode, busy week,a lot of some acting stuff
coming through.
So if you're hungering for thenormal length.
(12:41):
I do apologize, but I hope anice, short, sweet one, and I
wish you, of course, the mostincredible week, so, so full of
of little laughs, medium laughs,big, hearty chuckles, maybe an
eye-watering laugh.
I'll tell you the story of it.
(13:01):
I'll tell you my oneeye-watering laugh this week.
I hadn't had a laugh like thisin a long time.
My son is playing the trumpetfor school.
It's a required thing.
I was talking to my sister onthe phone, amanda, and Amanda is
an easy laugh If there's anyconfidence I need.
(13:23):
Before going up, I did my standup set for her and, bless her
soul, she was in a car accident.
So she, her laugh is like kindof it's her voice disappears.
It's sort of like she laughs,it's like ah, and then she goes
silent because she's lost herbreath.
So when I do these stand-upsets for my sister, she's
(13:48):
basically silent the whole time,not breathing.
So I have to really go throughit because she's just laughing
the whole time.
So, anyway, her laugh cracks meup so much I should have her on
the pod at some point, anyway.
So we're talking and she's not.
(14:10):
She was pretty down.
And then my son, I'm like man,I can't play the trumpet.
I'm sorry I can't talk to you.
Louie is practicing the trumpetand he never practices and Louie
, just immediately on cue, makesthis noise.
That sounds like such an insanefart.
(14:31):
You know like, and I'm like god, and I hear, I hear amanda
start to laugh, like she knewexactly what I was like laughing
at too.
And then we were.
We basically had louis forabout four minutes.
Louis was making, he was sogood at it he basically puts the
(14:56):
trumpet in the couch cushionand like it's like, you know
like, really great fart sounds.
And it was just, it was a crylaugh to the point where my
daughter came around who wasdoing her homework, and she's
(15:17):
like just so mad that her dadwas like a fart laugher.
I know I'm trying to be funny.
Like that's the only thing thatreally gets me.
It's basically people fallingdown and people with a well and
well-timed farts.
What can I say, man, that's mysense of humor.
All right, that's all I got foryou.
Uh, I don't know what promisesI made, but I 50, 50, we hold to
(15:42):
them.
That's just how we roll.
Uh, anyway, I wish you, I wishyou.
That's right.
I'm coming back to what we weretalking about.
I wish you so much, so mucheye-watering laughter.
Thank you.
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